Chapter 6
Chapter Six
T he next day, Danielle let out a curse as she stood in her bathroom, staring at the now spraying faucet. She couldn’t believe that this was happening again. She thought it was fixed—apparently the spit and Duct tape routine that Roger had used to fix it last time had given out.
Now, she was Noah in her own apartment minus the Ark.
“Whoa,” Jesse said as he passed by the bathroom and surveyed the watery mess.
“Help?” she asked as she waved her wrench around in the air. If only she’d actually listened when her grandfather had attempted to teach her how to fix plumbing, she wouldn’t be in this pickle.
Jesse shook his head. “Nope. Last time I tried to help, you just got mad at me.” Then he made his way into his room. “Call Roger.”
Danielle let out a grumble as she grabbed her phone and located the number. Her phone slipped just as she pressed on it. She scrambled to right it and stuck it under her chin as she walked over to the half-soaked towel to dry her hands.
“Hello?”
“It’s Danielle from 3B. Hey, my faucet is spraying all over the place. Can you come fix it?”
There was a long pause and Danielle wondered if she’d accidentally hung up. “Hello?”
“Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled into the phone. “I’ll be there.”
Danielle let his voice wash over her. Since when had his voice changed? “Are you sick? You sound like you have a cold.” She picked up the wrench and banged it against the faucet. She’d brave whatever cold Roger had if it meant she wasn’t going to have to build a ship just to leave her apartment.
“Yes.”
She sighed as she pushed her hair from her face with the back of her hand. “Well, just get over here before we drown.”
He mumbled an affirmative response and hung up. Danielle flung her phone out into the hallway and then turned back to her bathroom. She was going to mitigate as much damage as she could until Roger got there.
Fifteen minutes later and after every towel she owned was soaked, there was a knock on the door. She peered into the hall. Crap. “Come in,” she yelled.
When there was no response, she angled her head towards Jesse’s room. “Door, Jesse.”
She held her breath as Jesse’s door opened and her son appeared. “What?”
“Door,” she said, motioning her head toward the door to emphasize what she was saying.
Jesse nodded and made his way over.
“Hey,” a deep and very familiar voice said.
Danielle’s stomach leapt into her throat as she closed her eyes. Why was Zach here? How did he even learn where she lived?
“Hey,” Jesse said.
Desperate to get those two away from each other, Danielle dropped the towel and rushed over to the door. “I’ve got this, you can go back to your room,” she said, grabbing the door and motioning toward Jesse’s room.
Jesse looked confused and then shrugged. “Fine,” he said as he turned and obeyed.
Heat pricked the back of her neck as she turned and forced a smile. “What are you doing here?” she asked as she glanced behind him, praying Roger would walk up.
Zach seemed to notice as he followed her gaze. “You, um, called me. Said you have a leak?” He raised up his toolbox until it was in her line of sight.
“No I didn’t,” she said. Her ears were ringing from his words. Had she called him?
Zach furrowed his brow. “Yes you did. Said you had a leak and needed me to come fix it.” He looked so uncertain for someone who towered over her.
Danielle glanced back at her phone. She must have hit the wrong phone number by accident. “I didn’t mean to if I did. So, sorry. Thanks for coming over but I think we’ve got it handled.” Just as the words left her lips, a loud clanging noise rang out from the bathroom. She winced as she could only guess what had fallen from the now damp sheetrock.
When she glanced back at Zach, he didn’t look convinced. Then he sighed, pushing his hands through his hair. “I’m here, might as well let me take a look at it,” he said, pushing past her and into her apartment.
All sorts of excuses for why Zach shouldn’t come into her apartment rushed through her mind. All of them started with the desperation she felt from the fact that he was about to see where she lived. How meager her apartment was.
This was not the dream she’d made for herself all those years ago when they would talk about their hopes for the future.
From the hesitation in Zach’s step when he walked in, embarrassment flushed her cheeks. She needed to get him out. Now.
“I think I’ve got this handled. You can just go,” she said, opening the door wider and then stepping in front of him, trying to halt him from coming in further.
It wasn’t that her apartment was dirty. If anything, cleanliness was about the only thing she could do about this place. It was just small and worn out. Like it had given up on hope, just like her.
Zach glanced down at her and she could see his stubbornness creeping up. “Show me the bathroom. I can fix your faucet.”
Realizing that she probably shouldn’t be getting in a tug of war with a NFL player, Danielle sighed and nodded, motioning toward the bathroom. “The faucet is in there.”
Zach followed her gesture and then nodded. “Got it,” he said over his shoulder as he walked.
She reached up her finger to her lips and began to gnaw on her nail. Why was Zach here? Why didn’t he just tell her that she had the wrong number? Why come all the way over here just to help her?
And what the heck was she going to do about him meeting Jesse? Did he notice the similarities? Would he suspect that Jesse was his nephew?
She needed to find a way to get Jesse out of the house. Right now.
Sunny. Hopefully Sunny wasn’t busy and would be able to take Jesse out of the house. Calming her nerves, she walked nonchalantly over to the bathroom and located her phone. She crouched down and grabbed it.
Zach had his head under the sink and thankfully, didn’t notice her.
With her phone in hand, she made her way into her bedroom and found Sunny’s number—she made sure of it three times.
“Hey,” Sunny said after three rings.
“Can you take Jesse out of the house for me?”
Pause. “Why?”
“My faucet is broken and I have a repairman here to fix it.”
“Okay.”
Danielle closed her eyes as she silently shouted a hallelujah. “Great.”
“Be there in three.”
Thankfully, Sunny’s apartment was just above Danielle’s. Now she just needed to get her son out of here before the repairman realized that Jesse was his nephew.
Grabbing Jesse’s shoes that he’d kicked off in her room the night before, Danielle opened her door and slipped into his bedroom. Jesse was laying on his bed, reading.
“Get up. Sunny’s going to take you to the park,” Danielle said as she set his shoes down on the ground and motioned toward them.
Jesse stared at her and then back down at his shoes. “It’s hot outside.”
Danielle heard her front door open and Sunny call out a hello. Desperate to get both of them out of her apartment before Zach got dragged into a conversation, Danielle reached into her pocket and pulled out a twenty. “That’s why Sunny’s going to take you to get ice cream too,” she said, waving the bill in front of Jesse.
Jesse hesitated and then nodded as he jumped off the bed. He grabbed the money as he slipped his shoes on and headed toward his door.
“Hello, strange person,” Sunny’s voice carried into Jesse’s room just as he opened the door.
Danielle tried not to groan as she saw Sunny leaning on the doorframe of the bathroom. There went her attempt to get Jesse out of her apartment unseen.
Zach said hello and appeared in the doorway. His smile was wide and genuine and caused butterflies to take flight in Danielle’s stomach.
He turned to her and then looked over at Jesse. A desperate need to protect her son rushed over her and she pushed Jesse out his bedroom and into the hallway. While she was there, she collected Sunny and started to drag the both of them to the front door.
“Hey—what—” Sunny protested, but Danielle didn’t let up until both were out the door and out into the hallway.
Once they were safely out of earshot, Danielle turned to Sunny and gave her an apologetic smile. “Well, have fun and I’ll text you when the apartment is all fixed up.”
Thankfully, Jesse was bored with their conversation and had moved over to the window at the end of the hall and was staring outside. Sunny gave her a funny look as she leaned in.
“Who was the hunk inside?”
Great. There was no way Sunny was going to leave without asking about Zach which was the last thing Danielle wanted to talk about. Blowing a loose strand of hair from her face, Danielle glanced over to Jesse and back to Sunny.
“He’s just a guy I have to interview for the summer.”
Sunny studied her. “That doesn’t make sense. Why would he be here? In your apartment if he’s just someone you are interviewing.”
Tucking her hair behind her ears, Danielle groaned. “We go way back,” she said, hoping it would appease Sunny’s prying. It didn’t work. It piqued her interest more.
“How far back? And what does that even mean?” Then a knowing look passed over her face. “Is he Jesse’s dad?”
Heat rushed to Danielle’s cheeks as she instantly shushed Sunny. This conversation needed to end. Right now. Before truths were revealed and a past was uncovered. “Will you stop? And no. It’s not like that. He’s just someone I grew up with that I now have to interview. I accidentally called him and here we are.” Danielle extended her arms out to emphasize her words.
Sunny watched her closely and Danielle could see the thought yeah, right playing in her eyes. Hopefully Sunny would pick up on Danielle’s look of desperation for her to drop it.
When Sunny sighed, Danielle felt her tension lessen. This was good. It looked as if Sunny just might drop it.
“Are we going or have we made the hallway the new park?” Jesse asked as he turned and studied them.
Realizing just how old her son was getting, Danielle grew nostalgic. She walked over to him and tousled his hair, to which he ducked down in protest.
“Hey, the hair, mom.”
She snorted as she pulled him close and hugged him. She’d been so young when she had him that it had always felt as if they were just two kids, trying to figure things out. That in a way, they were growing up together. “You can go,” she said, finally releasing him. He stepped a good five feet away from her and adjusted his hair.
Sunny motioned for him to follow and as they walked down the hall, Danielle could feel her stress lessen.
“You owe me a story!” Sunny called over her shoulder as she disappeared around the corner.
Danielle gave her a noncommittal wave as she turned the door handle and made her way into her apartment…and right into Zach’s bare chest.
He was standing in her kitchen, wiping his gloriously tanned skin with a tiny kitchen towel. When he saw her, he seemed just as startled as she felt, standing there in the open door.
She cleared her throat as she dropped her gaze and stepped inside. “Um, is everything okay?” She forced herself to speak even though her voice was wavering like a teenager going through puberty.
“I got sprayed and these were the only dry towels available,” he said, his low, smooth voice twisting her stomach and making her feel lightheaded.
“Oh, yeah,” she said, making her way over to her desk in the far corner, putting as much distance between her and Zach as physically possible in her tiny apartment, and fiddled with a stack of papers there. She couldn’t help but study him from the corner of her eye. At first, he was watching her as if waiting to see what she was going to do. Then, he focused on drying off his arms, chest, and then face and hair.
Danielle finally had to drop her eyes and stare—probably a bit to hard—at the writing on the top paper. He’d certainly changed since they were teenagers. He’d always been tall but gangly. Now? Yeah, gangly was not the word she would use to describe him.
“So, you have a son or nephew?”
At the mention of Jesse, she jerked up to see him smiling in an uncomfortable and unsure way. Realizing that he wasn’t suggesting who the father was, she forced herself to calm down.
“Um, yeah. He’s my son.” Why couldn’t she just get her emotions under control? Zach was going to see through this facade. She just knew it.
Zach remained quiet as he ran the towel over his hair. Then he nodded. “I always knew you’d make a great mom. He’s how old?”
Not sure how she felt about Zach’s compliment, she decided to shrug it off. “He’s, um, six,” she lied, dragging out every syllable of the last word.
It didn’t feel natural, lying to Zach, but right now, she’d do just about anything to keep Jesse’s age a secret. Besides, this was probably the last time Zach would grace her apartment. Why was she worried that he might find out and get upset?
This meeting between them was just a blip on her radar. Once he fixed her faucet and she got her story, they’d be done. Just as they had been years ago.
Zach lifted up his shirt and stared at it. “There’s probably no way you have something I can wear,” he said, glancing over at her.
Danielle chewed her lip as she thought through what she had. The only thing she could come up with was probably the last thing Zach wanted to wear. It was a shirt she got Isaac at a fair once and had taken it after he passed away as a reminder. It was buried in a box in her closet and honestly, she wasn’t even sure it was still there.
“I do, but I’m not sure you want it,” she said, the breathiness of her voice surprising even her.
Zach raised his eyebrows. “Why? Was it your ex’s?”
Danielle’s stomach squeezed at the thought of Isaac. “Yes,” she whispered, hoping he’d understand from her tone and that one little word.
Zach studied her with a smile before it dropped. “Oh,” he said.
Danielle nodded and an awkward silence fell around them. She watched as he tried to process what she’d said. When he moved to speak, she realized just how much they had to unpack and suddenly, she didn’t want to do that.
“But it’s okay. I mean, it’s in the past and it’s not like he’s coming back to claim it.” She shot him a smile as she fought back the tears that were forming on her lids. Geez, why was she so weak? Isaac had been gone for so long, she’d moved on. But, with the return of Zach, everything that she’d thought she’d successfully buried wasn’t as buried as she thought.
He started to protest but she waved him away as she moved past him to her bedroom. He reached out to stop her, but she wouldn’t let him, breaking the grasp he had on her arm.
“Dani,” he said, his voice low with caution.
“It’s okay. I’m okay. It’s fine.” She pinched her lips together. Well, when she said that over and over like that, he’d realize that it wasn’t fine. Or, maybe it was but Danielle just wasn’t clear on how to make it fine.
Zach was quiet and when Danielle looked up to see what he was thinking, she could see that he was concerned about her. She focused on him, hoping that he’d understand what she needed and drop this conversation. That unpacking the past was the last thing she needed.
He held her gaze for a moment longer before he nodded. “Okay. If you’re okay with it,” he said.
Danielle forced a smile. “Of course. Let me go get it. I mean, it’s the least I can do for the guy who comes over to fix my faucet.”
She glanced toward the bathroom just to make sure that was indeed correct. From the lack of a spraying sound coming from that direction, her hope was confirmed.
When she turned back to Zach, he had his arms folded across his chest and he was watching her. The look in his eyes caused her heart to pound just a tad bit harder. Which frustrated her.
Giving him a small smile, she nodded as she made her way into her room and shut the door. Now alone, she leaned against the wall and took a breath. She was rapidly losing control of her emotions and she needed to get her mind straight. Right now. Before he suspected what she was hiding and her secret was no longer her own.